UNISON General Secretary to launch Scottish campaign with attack on £300m local service cuts

Date: Fri 5 Feb 2010

UNISON, Scotland’s largest public service union, will hold a rally in Glasgow Royal Concert Hall, tomorrow (Saturday) at which the union’s General Secretary – Dave Prentis will launch their Public Works – anti cuts campaign.

Dave will announce that the union’s research has uncovered cuts of £300m across Scottish local government with a planned job loss of over 3,000.

The rally, will be attended by around 400 UNISON delegates from branches all across Scotland, and invited guests from communities fighting cuts. It will take place at 12 noon in the exhibition hall of the Royal Concert Hall in Glasgow.

Dave Prentis will urge the government to call time on financiers who say that public spending isn’t sustainable at the same time as taking million pound bonuses.

“No nurse got a million pound bonus for gambling other people’s money,” he will say. “None of our members created this recession, why should they be expected to pay for the recovery?”

He will also point to the danger of cuts plunging the economy back into recession as public spending is the only engine of growth we have.

The media are welcome to attend the rally and to photograph or film. Dave Prentis will be available for interviews. Please contact Chris Bartter, below for access and to arrange any interview.
ENDS

Note for editors: UNISON’s Public works campaign is part of the union’s UK million voices for change campaign. It will be formally launched by UNISON General Secretary Dave Prentis at a rally in Glasgow’s Royal Concert hall on Saturday 6 February at 12 noon.
Details at http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/publicworks/

UNISON’s Alternative Budget can be found at
http://www.unison.org.uk/million/resources/Alternative_Budget.pdf


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